Talk:Oyster card

Some info no longer up-to-date

For example, Oyster IS now accepted on Heathrow Express, and online top-ups are no longer tied to a specific station (although the deadline to pick-up is shorter). — Preceding unsigned comment added by 146.90.48.58 (talk) 03:52, 1 December 2020 (UTC)

Clarification

'Since 2003...' - a date would be useful (so 'Between 2003 and ...'). Jackiespeel (talk) 12:19, 24 March 2022 (UTC)

GBP vs. British pound sterling vs. sterling

Recently, an IP editor has been replacing "GBP" with "sterling" on four articles (including this one) claiming that "GBP" is a useless "meaningless line of machine code" and that other articles use "sterling" instead of "GBP". An attempt to change this to "British pound sterling" was reverted with Revert WP:POINTy edit. GBP is a meaningless line of machine code; Sterling is the actual currency name. See renminbi vs, "CNY".

I fail to see how this is WP:POINTY. One would not refer to the United States dollar as the "dollar", for example, as that would be confusing. Hence, it makes sense to mention the country as well (namely "British pound sterling"). – Epicgenius (talk) 15:50, 7 August 2023 (UTC)

I noticed that some instances of the infobox template used on this page give the currency name (e.g. ORCA card), while this one used a code which is unintuitive to the lay reader.

The currency is called sterling, much as the Chinese currency is called renminbi, one could use "pound sterling", which is the direct link to the article and which I would be willing to support.

Please do not misrepresent me, I did not say "useless", I said "meaningless". Most lay readers are unlikely to understand what ISO codes are because its part of the arcane world of international finance and would be better served by simply giving the currency name. 89.240.206.71 (talk) 15:56, 7 August 2023 (UTC) Ban-evasion by WP:Sockpuppet investigations/TheCurrencyGuy 74.73.224.126 (talk) 14:23, 11 August 2023 (UTC)

I apologize, I did mean to type "meaningless line of machine code", but somehow that was muddled up. I still feel like the lay person would still have a rudimentary understanding of the Great British pound, but I think "pound sterling" would be good as well. The US currency by comparison is just called the "dollar", but many articles use the wording "United States dollar" to distinguish from other dollars, so I thought it would be good to distinguish by country. As such, I was confused when you described that edit as POINTy, despite the fact that I was genuinely trying to clarify the nationality of the currency (I changed it back to "British pound sterling", not "GBP"). – Epicgenius (talk) 16:22, 7 August 2023 (UTC)

The issue at hand is that these codes are not abbreviations; "Great British Pound" is a fictitious backronym devised to justify the code. The code itself never had any inherent meaning when it was constructed. A parallel is how "SOS" does not mean anything in itself ("save our souls" and "save our ship" are likewise also backronyms). SOS was chosen simply because the letters sound very distinct in Morse code to operators. 89.240.206.71 (talk) 16:34, 7 August 2023 (UTC) Ban-evasion by WP:Sockpuppet investigations/TheCurrencyGuy 74.73.224.126 (talk) 14:23, 11 August 2023 (UTC)

Regardless of what your personal opinion on codes - for consistency, we should use what is commonly used in the infobox. EZ-Link, OMNY, Octopus card, Nol Card etc - they all use the currency abbreviation ISO_4217. Many currencies have codes that do not match their name (Swiss franc, for example).

Template:Infobox_electronic_payment says we should have "the currency accepted, use the abbreviation when possible." If you disagree, take it to the infobox talk page! Turini2 (talk) 16:40, 7 August 2023 (UTC)

@Epicgenius: I have a feeling that TheCurrencyGuy may be the IP here. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 20:20, 7 August 2023 (UTC)

Merge proposal

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.

The result of this discussion was to merge the pages due to several months without discussion nor opposition. Synorem (talk) 00:47, 1 February 2024 (UTC)

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I propose merging Oyster card (pay as you go) on National Rail into this article as it doesn't make a lot of sense for them to be separate. Stifle (talk) 11:06, 31 August 2023 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.